Deep Glamour: At the Intersection of Imagination & Desire

Justified Lust

Many women (including my wife) enthusiastically agree that actor Timothy Olyphant is incredibly hot. As Marshall Raylan Givens in FX channel’s Justified, he is as dangerous as a heart-throb as he is with a gun.

When portraying Marshall Givens in dangerous situations, Olyphant uses his eyes and sly smile to convey the feeling that Givens is coolly sizing up the opposition. Marshall Givens usually seems less prone to rage than the sheriff Olyphant played in Deadwood. Nonetheless, Olyphant makes us feel that Marshall Givens will kill without a moments hesitation, if justified. And since Justified is set in a contemporary rural Kentucky environment filled with dangerous criminals, guns, and drugs, Givens’s expertise with a handgun does frequently come into play.

A number of things seems to make Olyphant particularly attractive to women. He is tall and lean-muscled, with a body like a fashion model. He is boyishly handsome, with a lush head of hair. As Marshall Givens, Olyphant’s intense, dark-eyes sometimes narrow into threatening slits as he looks out from under his cowboy hat. But a sideways glance from those dark eyes, combined with a sly smile, seems to make many of his female fans go weak in the knees.

Olyphant has been talked about as one of the new male actors who have a notable flair with style. GQ magazine recently named his Raylan Givens character as the most stylish man on TV (their site has a great photo of Olyphant in costume). In a December 2011 GQ article Sarah Goldstein wrote that even some men have crushes on Marshall Givens. And Olyphant himself admits that he enjoys playing a badass character like Raylan.

 

The Glamour of Beautiful Servers

While dining last night at the Bluehour (shown to the left), one of the most fashionable contemporary restaurants in Portland’s Pearl District, my wife Carol commented that part of the expense of dining there was paying to have beautiful servers. Once she mentioned this, I realized that the serving staff was indeed remarkably attractive.

The stylish young hostess who seated us had long, curly blonde hair and wore a little red dress that, while undeniably sexy, was too fashionable to look cheap. The host (floor manager?) was young, tall, handsome, and wore a beautifully tailored black suit.

The other servers were all dressed in white. Carol thought that the young woman who filled our water glasses was more beautiful than Alicja Bachleda, the striking actress in Ondine, a film we had recently seen. This young woman had the tall, thin figure of a runway model, and, like runway models, she and the tall, handsome male servers maintained neutral expressions as they fulfilled their duties. 

Their task, I realized, was not to engage with us. Instead, their role was to slip in like attractive, lithe-limbed apparitions and magically do whatever was needed to maintain the glamour of our dining experience. As when, for example, the knife I had used to spread butter was, at the proper moment, whisked away with effortless grace and replaced with a new one. 

Our waiter was also dressed in white, and was tall, trim, older, and slightly balding. He seemed to love his work. He had a highly engaging smile, and a manner so relaxed that you immediately felt at ease. This made it easy to ask questions about the more exotic ingredients in various entrées. 

The food was remarkably good and inventive, but the impression that I was most left with was now effortless the whole remarkable dining experience had been made to seem. Castiglione’s term sprezzatura came to mind because the staff appeared to handle everything with effortless grace, thus concealing the training and experience that had made this possible.

That maintaining this sense of effortlessness is difficult was made apparent the following evening. While dining in another fine restaurant the floor manager called attention to herself by wearing an ill-fitting suit made out of cheap material. A small mistake compared to the great food, but it led us to wonder if there would be other small mistakes. And once we had switched to that frame of mind, naturally enough, we did notice a few other flaws. 

 

 

Ditching a Younger Sibling

As I was headed to a going-out-of-business sale at the Border’s Bookstore in Santa Fe, I saw something that probably happens millions of times a day around the world. An older sibling was trying hard not to appear connected to a younger. In the photo shown at left, two sisters are distancing themselves from their parents and younger brother behind them. And, sadly, at some point in her teen years, the older sister will protest if told she needs to let her sister tag along.

In Santa Fe I saw a nattily dressed boy of about seventeen purposely walking very fast, forcing his younger sister to periodically have to run or skip to catch up. He was trim, attractive, and had impeccably styled hair. He was wearing a nice sport coat with a well-matched shirt and tie, nice trousers, and well-polished dress shoes. He perhaps looked a bit preppy for the bookstore, but there was no question he looked  confident and sharp.

His younger sister was about thirteen or fourteen, and I could see why he was trying to ditch her. She was pudgy, her hair was a mess, and her unattractive pink dress fit horribly. She had put on a long-sleeved t-shirt under the dress for warmth, and this make her outfit look even worse.

While he looked sophisticated, she looked clueless. Once in the bookstore, they separated, and I never saw him go anywhere near her the whole time I was there.

I told this story at a dinner gathering the other night, and many people starting talking about their relationships with their siblings. One woman’s younger brother (by two years) used to like to hang out with her girl friends when they came over, and she was not happy that her friends found him so funny that they liked having him around. Although she had a good relationship with him, she reached her limit when he tried to join them at their lunch table at high school. After all, she laughingly recalled , “I was a senior!”

No matter how close we might usually be to our siblings, there are times when they can interfere with the image we are trying to project, especially in the strange peer-pressure world of junior high and high school.

[Photo "Hey, Alice, I've been thinking: we're old enough to go out on our own now, without Mom and Dad and our younger brother tagging along and slowing us down" by Ed Yourdon. Used under the Flickr Creative Commons license.]

Choosing Representatives for Cosmetics

A small battle takes place each day at the dental office where I get my teeth cleaned. One dentist likes rock music, and if he gets there first, the radio is set to a oldies rock station for the day. If the other dentist gets there first, she sets the radio to a country-western station. 

Last week, hearing the music, I assumed that she had gotten there first, but it turned out that on that day she had rebelled against the system. The radio had been on the rock station for several days, and deciding she could not take hearing Cher one more day in a row, she had changed the channel.

Because music often serves as a cultural marker, I assume that cosmetics companies think carefully before choosing singers as representatives. CoverGirl has chosen country singer Taylor Swift (seen above) as one of their current faces, and it would be fascinating to know the demographic considerations that were discussed when they were considering her.

Viva Glam has chosen Lady Gaga as a current representative. In this advertising photo for them she looks far less made-up than she usually does in public appearances. Nonetheless, it reveals a different approach to makeup—reflecting the more over-the-top notion of glamour that Lady Gaga favors. She already serves, for example, as do Cher and Madonna, as a favorite singer for drag queens to impersonate.

Carrie Underwood, another country singer, has a contract with Olay cosmetics, and she seems an apt choice to appeal to a demographic of slightly more mature women than would Taylor Swift or Lady Gaga. It must be fascinating to hear the frank pros and cons that are brought up when cosmetic companies are discussing decisions about product representation. Appealing to their target customers is no doubt big business in terms of sales.

 

Experiencing Glamour

As a word glamour is tricky to define. Whether any of us experience something as being glamorous depends on our individual responses. I find Charlize Theron’s hair and makeup wonderfully glamorous in the photo at left, while others may not. I feel certain that the intent was to create a glamorous photograph, but intending something to be perceived as glamorous does not insure we will all respond to it in that way.

In dressing for the Oscars, Theron has made some choices that bombed with most fashion critics. Most people felt that the Christian Dior dress that she wore to the 2010 Oscars looked regrettable on her, and it made many worst-dress lists. The Christian Dior dress (shown at right) that she wore to the 2005 Oscars was panned by some as suitable for a high-school prom, but most loved it, and it has appeared on several lists as one the best Oscar dresses of the decade. When you see a large photograph of her making her entrance onstage in this dress, you can almost imagine that it was chosen knowing what the stage colors and design were going to be. The effect of the dress in relationship to that stage design is stunning.

In a situation when something strikes us as stunningly glamorous, the archaic meaning of glamour as magic or enchantment still seems relevant. What we experience seems to cast a spell on us, and what we perceive seems like an enchantment. Even while under the spell, we may sense that what we are experiencing is in part a transient, artful conjuration, and that everything possible has been done to try to make us feel we are experiencing glamour at its epitome, fully incarnated.

Small wonder this is so difficult to pull off—the slightest incongruity can break the spell of glamour. Oh, but what a delightful experience to have when the enchantment works as planned.

 

Fashionable Hair: Inspired by...?

Someday someone may see a picture of you and likely smile or laugh when they realize that you were wearing your hair in the fashion of the age, most likely inspired by your favorite actor or singer. I offer as evidence this picture of my maternal great-grandfather and great-grandmother and their children. All of the women are wearing the 1920s-fashionable Marcel wave. With the string of pearls all of them probably felt as up-to-date as film star Mary Pickford, shown below with the same look (except that Mary smiles and dares to bare her shoulders). My grandfather, the only male offspring, has his hair slicked back in the fashion of Rudolph Valentino.

Looking at high-school and college yearbooks from a few decades gives us the perspective to see just how conformist we sometimes can be. My wife laughs when she sees that most of her friends were wearing the same hair style that she was. Many of the boys in my high school wore some version of Elvis Presley’s or James Dean’s hair, hoping somehow that their charisma would magically transfer to us.

Tina Fey has admitted having a girl crush on Dorothy Hamill (shown here receiving an Olympic skating medal). Fey got a Hamill-style haircut, plus wore a big Dorothy Hamill button. Hamill’s wedge cut flowed so beautifully when she skated that some commentators have lamented the lack of something similar at the last Winter Olympics.

How about DG readers? What actor, singer, or athlete had the glamorous hair that you and many classmates aspired to? For inspiration, here’s a site showing many 20th-century hairstyles, and another showing 10 of the most popular hairstyles.

 

Etsy Incongruity: Feminine Tattoos and a Vintage Dress

Perusing Etsy's vintage shops, I came upon this interesting juxtaposition. The tight-waisted, full-skirted '50s vintage dress is just as "alternative" as the model's tattoos, and the tattoos are as overtly feminine as the dress. The contemporary counterpart of the woman who first wore the dress is probably wearing jeggings and several carefully layered knit tops. For more photos (or to buy the dress), click here.

 

The Seduction of Hair

Hair is having a major cultural moment. Disney’s Tangled, a retelling of “Rapunzel” that features what one blogger calls “ninja hair,” is a monster hit, while nine-year-old Willow Smith (daughter of Will and Jada) has become an instant star with her exuberant video “Whip My Hair.”

Meanwhile, in Paris, where they take both fashion and cinema far too seriously to produce celebrations of ninja-hair-whipping, the Cinématèque Française has mounted an exposition devoted to the portrayal of women’s hair in the movies. Titled “Brune-Blonde” (“Brunette-Blonde”), it runs through January 16, with an online version here. The poster features the naturally brunette Penelope Cruz as a platinum blonde, and the exhibit’s intellectual theme is Hollywood’s role in fostering a now-fading “blonde imperialism.”

There is something fascinating, seductive, and slightly unnerving about human hair. It’s a constant reminder of how little control we really exercise over the bodies that define us to other people. Lacking nerves and muscles, hair is simultaneously part of its owner and yet somehow not. A defining part of a person’s appearance, it takes conscious artifice to control. Contrary to the title, Rapunzel's long tresses in Tangled are never in knots. When they start to get in the way, an adorable trio of little girls fashions them into a flower-filled braid worthy of Botticelli.

In the era of the faux-disorderly “messy bun,” the phrase “not a hair out of place” now connotes too much control, Betty Draper-style. But, taken literally, getting your hair under control is still a glamorous ideal. All that’s changed is the definition of “in place.” As a friend once remarked, nobody in a movie love scene ever says, “Owww, you’re on my hair.” 

 

Quick Impressions

Chances are the moment you saw this photograph you instantly had an opinion about it: whether you felt the model was beautiful, whether her red lipstick looked stunning or overdone. Studies have shown we form initial impressions surprisingly quickly. At Northwestern University researchers found that when they tested listeners by letting them hear tiny samples of music, the listeners were able to classify different styles of music based on samples lasting only 250 milliseconds. A half-second sample added only a little more accuracy, and with a sound sample lasting a second most listeners could classify every style of music they were familiar with. This is an astonishing finding, because it suggests that we use timbre, the character of the sound, to quickly do most of the work when we are identifying musical styles. 

This ability to form quick impressions is an extension of our survival skills, stemming from the need to assess sights and sounds that might indicate the presence of danger, or a friend, or an enemy. These quick impressions can of course be mistaken, but without the ability to form quick impressions our ancestors could not have survived. 

Those of you who have watched Project Runway or The Fashion Show know that you decide almost as soon as the model walks onto the runway whether you think her outfit is attractive. Later, you sometimes think the judges are crazy to like an outfit that you immediately found unattractive. If we watch an awards show in which music, film, and TV stars are trying to look glamorous, we take one look and quickly decide if we think they have succeeded or failed.

The model in the photograph above is Emily DiDonato, a relatively new model who has been featured in several recent Maybelline ads. The photo at right shows her with little or no makeup. For a chance to form other quick impressions, look at DiDonato made up in strikingly different ways here, here, and here. If we were to imagine each image as our first impression of her, then our initial reaction to her might be quite different.

Understanding this allows us to see why some religions have been suspicious of makeup for centuries. When we see an image of Emily’s face, within milliseconds we have evaluated her appearance and formed an initial impression about her as a person. When her makeup changes she instantly appears to be different—perhaps even a different kind of person. This is horrifying if you believe that people should present only one face to the world. But, if you believe that we play different roles in life, and that we should have the option of presenting ourselves differently, then the ability to dramatically change our appearance in various ways seems liberating and fun. 

Garden Kitsch

Sophisticated gardeners typically view garden gnomes as kitsch. However, I do know one sophisticated gardener with a weakness for gnomes who has a few scattered in a large garden on a property of several acres. She jokes that she has heard that each gnome she displays lowers the value of her property by a thousand dollars. 

In this light, it is fascinating to read the pages of comments on a Colorado’s 9News story which relates that someone stole almost 150 gnomes from the front landscape of an Arvada, Colorado home. Some readers sympathize with the home owner’s comment that, “You can’t have anything nice anymore.” Others argue that her idea of “nice” must have been amazingly tacky, and that someone did the neighborhood a service by getting rid of what had to have been a kitschy eyesore. 

To raise money for breast cancer research, the Colorado Women’s Resource Center has advertised that they will place of flock of 20 plastic pink flamingos on a friend’s lawn for one day for a fee of $30. Knowing that displaying a flock of pink flamingos puts the homeowner’s taste in question, they also offer anti-flocking insurance for $10—just in case you fear that one of your “friends” might impose them on you.

 

Ready for Your Snapshot? Facebook Paranoia as a Sales Tool

If my DG email inbox is any indication, people are getting increasingly paranoid about how they look in their Facebook photos. Or at least the publicists for various skincare and beauty products hope they are.

One PR query asks, "Is Your Face Facebook Ready?"

Did you know the there are more than 500 million active users on Facebook? Most people block their walls and photo albums, but profile photos are broadcast to anyone who cares to look—from new classmates to prospective employers. Don’t let a bad complexion ruin your image on Facebook… and beyond. Prep your skin for your close up with Vichy Laboratoires skincare solutions. Whether you have acne scars, puffy eyes or oily skin, Vichy will help you put your best face forward.

Another has the subject line, "Look Picture Perfect!"

Unfortunately, every picture you are photographed in isn’t always Facebook “profile” worthy and we’ve all had photos taken that we are not proud of. Luckily, Romy Fazeli of Kymaro Health and Beauty offers quick inexpensive tips to give you a photo-ready look.

Her mixed-bag of recommendations includes a teeth whitener, body shapers, and jewelry. I wonder what they have in common?

Head Protection for Chic Bicyclists

A couple of weeks ago, I published a WSJ column citing research showing that while bicycle-helmet laws do save lives they also significantly discourage kids (especially teenagers) from riding bikes in the first place. The comments were lively and interesting—as I note in the article, this is a topic that excites all-or-nothing passions—with some people adamantly arguing that appearance is, or ought to be, completely irrelevant: "Riding a bike is not a fashion statement," declared one.

Wearing Yakkay helmets

Except, of course, that for many people it is. As both the WSJ and NYT have reported, bikes are gaining popularity among fashionable urban women. “The idea now is to look like a pedestrian on wheels,” a bike retailer told the NYT's Ruth La Ferla. Preferably one liked to be featured on The Sartorialist. The "lovely bicycle" is in, and it doesn't go with the typical bike helmet.

Fortunately, in bike-loving Scandinavia enthusiasts for both bicycles and head-protection have turned not to laws but to design. In my article, I briefly mention Yakkay, a Danish startup that offers stylish helmets with changeable covers. "If you make a stylish bicycle helmet you don’t need legislation," says CEO Michael Eide, "and in YAKKAY we wanted to make a helmet people actually want to wear." Now sold in Europe and Canada, Yakkay helmets will be available in the U.S. beginning next spring.

The Hövding: Protection without hat hair (click photo for larger image)

Taking a more radical approach is the Hövding (Chieftain), developed by Swedish designers Anna Haupt and Terese Alstin. An airbag disguised as a collar, it is, as Ariel Schwartz reports on Fast Company.com, "the complete antithesis of the hard-shelled helmets that cyclists have become used to." Six years in development, it will be available next year. Here's a video of how it works:

[Photos courtesy of Yakkay and Hövding.]

Failing to Notice

Husbands often disappoint their wives by failing to notice a new hairdo. But judging from my own experience and that of my neighbors, wives can be just as blind as husbands. I recently grew a full beard that I wore to a fund-raising event, then shaved off before attending a neighborhood potluck. My next-door neighbor noticed as soon as I shaved, but my wife didn’t notice until I pointed it out to her a day and a half later.

She felt guilty about not noticing, especially since this had happened before. I told her that our neighbor mentioned that he had worn a mustache his whole working career, then shaved it as soon as he retired, and his wife didn’t notice. Another neighbor woman also confessed that she had failed to notice when her husband shaved his mustache.

Should you find yourself caught in an embarrassing failure to notice, you might try the line my wife used on me the first time this happened, “I always focus on your eyes.”

Yeah, right. Still—I have to admit her excuse sounded pretty good accompanied as it was by a charming smile.

[PicApp photo of George Clooney sporting a bushy beard taken at the National Board of Review of Motion Pictures Awards gala at in New York City on January 12, 2010. Fame Pictures, Inc. Content © 2010 famepictures All rights reserved.]

Taking Fashion Risks

During recent trips to Santa Fe and Boulder I picked up some fun clothing items, including the 191 Unlimited shirt shown on the model at left. I had some interesting conversations with saleswomen, and more than one of them bemoaned her husband’s lack of interest in ever wearing stylish clothing. Their husbands always wore work clothes or very casual comfort clothes. One saleswoman and I agreed that some men and women seem uninterested in fashion, while others play it safe by wearing what most people around them are wearing. We both felt that developing a personal fashion sense is a slow, incremental process that involves some trial and error.

Any person hates to look foolish, but Carol Dweck’s mindset research at Stanford has shown that people who believe that abilities such as intelligence, musical talent, and athletic skills are unchangeable are the people who are most likely to avoid trying to master areas of endeavor that prove difficult for them. She has shown that children who have been praised because learning some subjects or skills seemed easy for them (“you’re so smart, gifted, or talented”) often absorb a darker side of that message which implies that if you have to work hard to master a particular subject or skill, it means that you have a permanent lack of aptitude in that area. So when some area proves difficult for these fixed mindset students to master quickly, they may feel that having to work hard at it makes them look inept, and they may then choose to avoid that subject as much as possible. In her research Dweck found, for example, that pre-med students with this fixed-ability mindset often changed majors when they encountered the first math or biology course that they had to work hard to pass.

On the other hand, children who have been praised for their hard work in learning various subjects and skills tend to believe that abilities can be developed incrementally, and they are usually far more willing to work hard to try to master subjects and skills that challenge them. They view making mistakes and learning from them as integral parts of the long-term process of growth. Dweck’s controlled studies have repeatedly shown that this incremental-growth mindset is far more likely to give students the grit needed to work hard and make it past various obstacles they encounter as they pursue their interests and goals.

I can understand that some people may have little interest in fashion, and others may not wish to differ in appearance from their peers. But I suspect that for some people, professing a lack of interest in fashion may  be a way to avoid giving others any opportunity to  judge them as trying and failing to be fashionable. One or two such failures may have already convinced them that they have little aptitude for fashion, and they assume that this will always be the case. And after dressing for years in an inconspicuous, blend-in way, trying something different might make the wearer too self-conscious to appear confident and comfortable.

For those whose mindset assumes that developing an ability is an incremental process, taking a fashion risk becomes a single step toward incrementally developing a personal fashion image. If some people suggest that your efforts on a particular occasion are partially flawed, you can deal with that. You realize that taking risks can lead to imperfect results, and if you decide that this effort didn’t work out as successfully as you had hoped, you assume that this one effort implies little or nothing about your long-term ability to develop an interesting personal sense of fashion. You move forward and try new possibilities.

For the first few years of elementary school one of my granddaughters, who loves animals, wore a tail to school and preferred mismatched socks. I thought this was fun, and I was proud that my daughter, a visual artist, was comfortable letting her daughter go to school dressed in an eccentric way. A gallery owner friend let her daughter choose to head off to the first day of kindergarten in full-length gloves. I don’t know what the fashion sense of either of these young girls will be as adults, but hopefully it will retain some measure of their childhood audacity.

[This PicApp Photo shows a model on the runway at the Davidelfin Spring 2011 fashion show during Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week at The Studio at Lincoln Center on September 16, 2010 in New York City. (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images for IMG). Content © 2010 Getty Images All rights reserved.]

Bridal Glamour: The Italian Difference

The beautiful bride at the window contemplating her new life is a standard trope in wedding gown ads. But this Italian ad includes an element you won't find in its American counterparts, at least not these days.

Looking Back at History Through Current-Colored Lenses

Editor's note: Ever since the launch of DG my friend David Bernstein (a Bay Area engineer, not the Volokh Conspiracy blogger) has been passing on interesting glamour-related links and observations. I've finally persuaded him to join us with the occasional post. Here's his debut. For more on this topic, check out this 1974 New York magazine article by Anne Hollander (and for a really creepy experience, keep scrolling to the one after it). [VP]

A couple of Sundays ago the other half was watching Little Women from 1949 on TV while I walked through the living room. Now, I'm an engineer, so fashion generally slides right past me, but the clothes of all the girls (little women?) activated the pattern recognition part of my brain. It seemed that they were all wearing dresses with inverted triangles over the upper torso. They struck me as looking more like photos I've seen of women from the post-World War II era rather than around the Civil War. It got me to thinking about how art that depicts history is affected by the time of the art itself, as opposed to that of the depicted history. It can be difficult to remove the current-colored lenses that we all peer through.

To illustrate the point, here is a montage of scenes from three different versions of Little Women.

Covert Affairs Costumes: What Does a Spy Chief Wear? No Sleeves, Apparently.

When tonight's episode of Covert Affairs airs, most fans of the USA Network spy drama will be looking at sexy leading lady Piper Perabo, who plays rookie CIA operative Annie Walker. I, however, will be wondering what sort of sleeveless outfit her boss Joan Campbell, played by Kari Matchett, will be sporting.

 

 

 

 

 

Unless she's on assignment, Annie dresses like a typical Washington professional--in suits (though not in the clip below). Joan, however, never covers her arms. Is this a new form of power dressing? Is it Michelle Obama's influence? Or is it yet another Hollywood fantasy? (They've been putting female detectives in tank tops for years. But at least they also have jackets.) You'd think that Langley's air conditioning alone would dictate more coverage.

 

Here are a couple more YouTube clips. Apparently I'm not the only one wondering about these outfits. There's a whole thread on IMDB.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Secret Lives of Servers

At a recent dinner in the harbor town of Newport, Oregon, the appearance of our youthful waitress sent confusing messages. She appeared to be about 20, had a slender figure, and wore no makeup on her innocent-looking face. She had heightened the aura of innocence by gathering her hair into pony tails on either side of her face, in a style popular with Japanese schoolgirls.

I then noticed that the edge of her left eyebrow was pierced by a delicate gold ring, and that each ear had multiple piercings. When she walked away, I could see that a dark-blue geometric tattoo covered most of her left calf. The piercings and tattoo suggested considerably less innocence than the rest of her appearance. Yet when I was paying the bill she mentioned that a customer had just spilled beer on her, which upset her because she didn’t drink.

Many people work part time as servers while going to school or pursuing careers where income is unpredictable. I would have loved to ask our waitress some questions about herself, but I was there with some of my wife’s relatives, and somehow it didn’t seem appropriate. On occasions when I have asked, I have discovered that I was being served by pre-med students, actors, artists, published novelists whose sales were modest, graduate students, and a variety of other aspiring individuals. For them, working in a restaurant was seldom the role that they most identified with, and from their appearance you would often have had a hard time guessing their larger aspirations.

I found this waitress intriguing. Was her innocent look a guise imposed upon her by this family-friendly restaurant? When she was not working as a waitress, did she wear makeup, and did it go with the tattoos and piercings? Was her abstinence from alcohol part of a healthy diet lifestyle that helped her stay slim? Did she have unsuspected aspirations? Was her “normal” appearance so different that I would scarcely recognize her? Did she turn into some glamorous creature of the night when she went on dates? Or was she simply an innocent young woman whose piercings and tattoo were nothing more than her idea of fashion?

["A Smile with Every Meal" is from Andrew Stawarz's Flickr photostream, and is used under the Flickr Creative Commons license.]

What Would They Have to Pay You to Wear This?

Fashion stylist Angie at the excellent YouLookFab.com blog recently challenged readers to tell her how much they'd have to be paid to wear this outfit in normal, everyday life. Among the first 70 replies prices ranged from $100 to a cure for cancer ("no amount of money would be enough"). Amazingly, a real online retailer charges £135 for the hot mess.

The outfit is hideous and inappropriate to pretty much every context. It also sends a strange signal about the wearer's identity (Hooker working Comic-Con? Unfortunately paired Project Runway model?).

But what about outfits that aren't downright ugly, just unconventional or signals of the wrong identity? How sensitive are you to social expectations? To making sure your wardrobe matches your self-image? How do you balance those two factors when identity and taste clash with convention? When I interviewed cosplayers at Anime Expo, several told me they wished they wear Edwardian-inspired fantasy outfits every day. On a more mundane note, I myself spend most days in jeans and T-shirts even though in theory I'd rather wear suits or dresses. It just seems strange to dress up to work at home.

So, to add to Angie's question, here are some less outre outfits to consider.

These pink and orange Lily Pulitzer silk pants sell for $98. I'm sure they have many fans, but they're definitely for people with very specific tastes. And they say the wearer is either a super-preppy or a wannabe. Along similar lines, consider madras pants, available for both men and women.

What would someone have to pay you to wear them to work? Or would you happily pay for the privilege yourself?

Moving on to a different taste subculture, how about this Renaissance Faire-influenced upcycled T-shirt dress? I love the color palette, and the "medieval style liripipe hood" and giant bell sleeves have a certain romance. But for everyday office wear? How much?

Finally, no such discussion would be complete without the classic Juicy Couture velour tracksuit, complete with rhinestone-encrusted crown. Everyday glamour? Or the wrong sort of signal? What's your price?

Got an outrageous outfit to share? Please add your own challenges, with links, in the comments below. We'll award a DeepGlamour goody bag to the one we like the best.

---advertisement---

The Glamour of Mystery and Surprise

The capacity of human beauty to move us has long been a source of mystery. In Christopher Marlowe’s 1587 play, Tamburlaine the Great, Tamburlaine’s rage for conquest causes him to destroy cities, kingdoms, and whole races. He kidnaps Zenocrate, the daughter of the Egyptian king, rapes or seduces her, then falls in love and marries her. They have three sons together, and when she dies he is inconsolable.

At one point, unable to understand why her beauty moves him so, Tamburlaine decides that if all the poets in the world, with all their wit, were to fashion the perfect tribute to beauty, then

“Yet should there hover in their restless heads
One thought, one grace, one wonder, at the least,
Which into words no virtue can digest.”

I chose this photograph of Monica Bellucci to illustrate our inability to fully express our sense of wonderment when we perceive beauty because it conceals her astonishingly sexy figure. The beauty of her face and figure are so impossible to ignore that many of her film roles have focused on the obsessive desire that her appearance fosters in men. In 2004 AskMen.com voted her the most beautiful woman in world.

This black-and-white portrait of Bellucci in her mid-40s allows us to see that part of her allure is her remarkable poise. She started modeling when she was sixteen, and for awhile she used her earnings to pay for law school before she eventually choose to pursue modeling and acting full time. She speaks Italian, French, English, and Spanish, and as an actress she has had speaking roles in each language. I suspect that her intelligence has helped her keep all the fuss about her appearance in perspective.

Looking at Bellucci’s dark Italian eyes, I also suspect that it would be impossible to ever fully “know” this woman. But I think the same is often true of the people that each of us loves and are closest to. We may get used to the patterns of living with someone after a number of years, but “getting used to” someone doesn’t mean that we fully “know them.” And I suspect that thinking we do can easily become an unfortunate mistake. There is something important to be said for retaining some sense of mystery, and periodically surprising your significant other with an unexpected action designed to please them can suggest that you never intend to take your relationship with them for granted.

As someone who enjoys surprising my wife with unexpected gifts, I once mentioned to a colleague that I thought I would pick up a dozen roses on the way home. He asked what the occasion was, and I said that there was no occasion, and that’s what would make it a nice surprise. He said that he had never done anything like that, and maybe he should buy roses too. Then after a moment’s thought, he said, “No, if I did that my wife would start the third degree on me, wanting to know what I had done wrong, and she would never let up.”

[The photo of Monica Bellucci is by Studio Harcourt Paris, and is used under the WikiMedia Commons license.  The “A Wonderful Surprise” photograph is by Flickr user audreyjm529, and is used under the Flickr Creative Commons license.]

Being Glamorous vs. Feeling Glamorous: Which Would You Prefer?

Randall's post about the aging motorcyclists raises an interesting question: What's the difference between being glamorous and feeling glamorous?

Since at least the 1930s, fashion magazines, cosmetics companies, and fashion houses have treated "glamour" as a style or product. "The gospel of Max Factor and [British makeup artists] the Westmores was that glamour could be achieved by any woman who put her mind to it," writes Carol Dyhouse in Glamour: Women, History, Feminism, citing a magazine's 1939 on the makeover of a charlady. (She wiped off her new face and went back to her regular life.) A makeover or special outfit may make someone look attractive, and looking attractive may make her feel glamorous, but is that all there is to actually being glamorous?

In her excellent new book American Glamour and the Evolution of Modern Architecture, architectural historian Alice T. Friedman examines mid-century buildings that were designed to make their occupants feel glamorous by framing their lives--literally, with windows and other structural outlines--and giving them a feeling of processing through a special space. Eero Sarinen's TWA terminal, she writes, "offered travelers a vivid architectural experience, one in which ordinary people were given the opportunity not simply to arrive and depart in style but also to process and promenade, to sit, stand, dine, and observe one another in spaces of a ceremonial quality previously reserved for only the privileged few." The terminal was glamorous, but judging from the ordinary-looking crowd in the accompanying photo, I can't say the same about the passengers. Slumping in their swoopy modern seats, they look tired and a little schlubby, hardly up to crisp Mad Men standards. (You can see the photo at the end of this online excerpt from the book.) They don't make me yearn to join their special world.

Real glamour requires a receptive audience. You can only be glamorous if others perceive you that way. Feeling glamorous, on the other hand, means that your mental picture of yourself is one that you would find glamorous. You become the audience for your own glamour, creating a image of yourself that veils your flaws. Defying the ultimate intimacy, you somehow manage to turn yourself into an alluring Other. As for actual others, they may see something different.

[Same Hair Prom Portrait by Flickr user foundphotoslj under Creative Commons license]

Still The Wild One?

While strolling past the Santa Fe, NM plaza, the amplified music of the folk singer entertainer was temporarily drowned out by a group of motorcyclists riding by. Their loud bikes shouted “look at me,” but I had already guessed what I would see. This would not be a youthful motorcycle gang led by a Marlon Brando  The Wild One look-alike, but aging fathers and grandfathers reliving the feelings of their youth. The do-rag of the gentleman who stopped closest to me held back not the luxuriant hair of youth, but the thinning gray hair of upper middle age. His minimally muffled Harley-Davidson might have sounded slightly menacing, but the rider looked benign. His portly figure spoke of too many beers and too much sitting, and for the sake of his body he would have been better off walking, hiking, or bicycling.

But this ride was not about how he appears to the outside world, but how he feels inside. Like many summer riders, during most weeks of the year his life revolves around the typical responsibilities that tie a man down: a wife, a family, a house, and a regular job or profession (assuming he’s not retired). But for the moment he is riding free: he has escaped all of that and feels unencumbered by conventional obligations.

Granted he may have to bring along a Lipitor prescription for his high cholesterol, and perhaps other medications for high blood pressure or other ailments, but these are far from his thoughts. And tonight he may have to phone home to let his wife know he is safe and well, assuming that she is not driving a support vehicle for the group and will meet him later at some prearranged motel. But none of that matters now. At this moment in time he has escaped the restraints of everyday existence, and with “Born to be Wild” as his mental soundtrack, he can imagine himself a youthful free spirit riding toward the unknown adventures of his future existence.

What Retrosexuals and Metrosexuals Have in Common (Besides the Obvious Pun)

 Writing in the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, William Loeffler proclaims the end of the Metrosexual:

The man's man is back. And he's had enough of unisex salons, simpering emo music and the emasculating kryptonite of the Oprahsphere. 

Or so say a spate of ads, books and websites that hail the emergence of the retrosexual, whose attitude and style hearken back to the strong, silent type of the '50s and early '60s.

The retrosexual keeps things simple. He does not own more hair and skin care products than his wife or girlfriend. He does not "accessorize."

Think Don Draper, the dapper, jut-jawed executive played by Jon Hamm in the AMC series "Mad Men." He may be a philanderer, but you won't find a pink shirt in his wardrobe. Like the dark hero characters of ex-spy Michael Westen in "Burn Notice" and U.S. Marshal Raylon Givens in "Justified," "Mad Men" presents alpha males who live unapologetically by their own code.

Loeffler's is the latest in a string of articles on the so-called Menaissance (see for instance this 2006 Boston Globe piece). What struck me, however, was the juxtaposition of Don Draper and Michael Westen (I've never seen Justified)--both exceedingly stylish figures. They may not own a lot of grooming products, but they do accessorize. Westen's sunglasses are, in fact, one of the show's signature props and have sparked much online discussion from viewers who want their own versions. (That'll be $400.)

The real contrast isn't between these guys and overgroomed Metrosexuals but between both groups, with their grown-up polish, and the beer-bellied American male in comfy shorts and untucked oversized shirt. On my recent trip to research glamour in Shanghai (more on that later), I talked with author and marketing consultant Paul French who, among many other interesting things, commented on why, with a few exceptions, American apparel lines haven't been terribly successful in Shanghai. U.S. companies are too attuned to the sloppy casualness of the American market, and Shanghainese like to look sharp. They want Banana Republic, he said, not The Gap--something that apparently escapes the parent company of both. (Instead of BR, there's a local knockoff called Urban Renewal.)

By way of illustration, French recounted what observed when two jet-lagged Americans came into the McDonald's where he and his 10-year-old son were having breakfast:

I noticed the Chinese were giggling at them. And then I looked at them. These guys were about my age. They’re in their 40s, right? And they had T-shirts, baseball caps, shorts, and then sort of sports shoes that looked like they had some tractor tires on the bottom of them. And I looked at them and then I looked my 10 year old who was not quite as casual as them.....If you put them on a bus and drove them around town, people would think they were retarded and going to the special place that they’re looked after for the day. I mean just isn’t it a shame? They never grew up mentality but they did physically.

No one would say that about either Michael Westen or Brad Pitt. What makes Retrosexuals seem manlier than Metrosexuals is their sprezzatura. They hide the artifice it takes to achieve their look. But the popularity of both models suggests that at least some American men want to escape the pressure to be sloppy.

--advertisement--

Finding a Look: The Value of Good Salespeople

Needing a new pair of glasses, I drove an hour to visit an eye wear store in Denver. I was told they had 4,000 “products” to choose from, with designs from all over the world. To help me narrow down the possibilities, I was meeting with Paige, the salesperson who had helped me choose my last pair of glasses. While working in a local shop, Paige had put me in a pair of glasses I would never have tried without her help. I knew she had done well because many people, including strangers, had subsequently commented on how much they liked my glasses.

I called a few hours early to let her know I was coming, and when I arrived she said she had been thinking about what eye wear she would like me to try ever since I had called. I sat in a chair while she walked around the store putting glasses on a tray, and she came back with about ten pairs to try. As soon as I tried some she would say “no,” and before long we were down to two choices that she felt looked great. Finding it hard to choose, we called another salesperson over, and that woman voted for the pair that she felt had more “edge.” So the choice became the Danish-designed Orgreen pair shown in the photograph.

I’ve described this satisfying shopping experience to illustrate why we go back repeatedly to work with good salespeople. Sadly, finding a salesperson with a good eye whose opinion you trust can be difficult. So when you locate such a salesperson, they become a valuable asset. In this case, when Paige changed where she worked, I followed her to her new location. Paige has helped several people I know choose their eye wear. Some friends told my wife and me about her, and I send people to her whenever they comment on my glasses or my wife’s. 

All too often you find yourself dealing with salespeople who don’t seem to hear what you’re telling them—they seem to ignore or not understand what you’ve said about the look you are hoping to find, the situation you need it for it, and so on. Sometimes they don’t even know the store’s merchandise well enough to help you narrow down your choices, whereas a good salesperson whose opinion you trust can save you a lot of time, and save you grief in other ways.

Last fall my wife was headed to an event in London. After she had the rest of her outfit picked out, she went to a shoe store that had a bewildering array of choices. She knew the look she wanted, so she picked out seven pairs of shoes to try on. With both arms full of samples, she showed a young salesperson her choices. My wife explained that the event would be in a huge exhibition center, and that she might be walking and standing for most of a day. To my wife’s surprise the young woman started taking shoes away from her, explaining that she was taking away any shoes that she felt would be uncomfortable after a few hours. My wife was left with only two choices, one of which was the pair of Dansko Sally suede clogs pictured at right.

Though my wife loved them, she doubted they would remain comfortable for a full day. The salesperson assured her they would, and thankfully it turned out she was right.

A friend of ours was going to the same event and purchased a pair of shoes without asking about comfort. He decided to test his purchase by spending an hour on his feet in them, after which he pronounced them “posing” shoes, not “wearing” shoes. He had to go shopping again to buy shoes he could wear all day.

Finding a salesperson who will tell you when something you are trying on doesn’t work well on you is a good start. Finding one who tells you that something “looks great on you” when it fits terribly is a signal to shop elsewhere. We once had artist residencies at Montalvo in California, with second-story rooms. The villa grounds were often used for elaborate weddings. I got to know the wedding planner, and looking down on one of those wedding ceremonies I commented to her that the strangely layered dress that the mother-of-the-bride was wearing looked as if her slip were showing. The wedding planner’s comment was, “Someone lied to her.”

Wireless Glamour: Why Lamp Ads Hide the Cords

Notice anything missing from the lamps on this page of a recent Crate & Barrel catalog? Of course you do. You read the headline. With one exception (top left), the lights glow without benefit of electric power. They have no cords.

Whether through careful styling or the handy use of Photoshop, the catalog’s designers have removed the unsightly evidence that these wares require external support. Or maybe the photographers just clipped off the cords.

There’s high-brow precedent for such editing. Paola Antonelli, the Museum of Modern Art’s delightful design curator, tells me that when she arrived at the museum she discovered that all the cords had been removed from the collection’s lamps. Some unknown museum employee had apparently thought trailing cords spoiled the designs—authenticity be damned. Paola had the lamps rewired. After all, modernity includes electricity. Like the Crate & Barrel catalog, however, the photos on the MOMA site, still omit cords. (There are exceptions, but they’re rare and recent.)

Erasing a lamp's cord makes the photo not only neater but more alluring. The viewer isn't distracted by thoughts of where the cord would need to go in the room or by fears of tripping on it. And such wireless autonomy is itself glamorous, suggesting a beauty and function independent of the unromantic infrastructure of power plants and the annoying expense of electric bills. Like the glamorous protagonists of escapist Golden Age movies, who had plenty of money but never seemed to work, lamps without cords need no outside support.

Are Cell Phones the New Glamorous Accessory?

Randall's post below, “If Someone Glamorous Walked By, Would You Notice?” is about the things you miss when you’re on your cell phone. But the title made me wonder what the person walking by might look like. 

When I searched Google images for “glamorous woman” and “walking,” I discovered a different connection between cell phones and glamour. The top three results were this stock photo, in which the woman is wearing sunglasses, the most classic glamorous accessory, while talking on a cell phone. (She’s also pushing a baby carriage, which may or may not be glamorous.)

Sunglasses, cigarettes, veils, hats, and fans are all classically glamorous accessories. All simultaneously attract attention and create distance. The audience gets an intriguing glimpse of the glamorous person, not a full view.

On a cell phone, the person is similarly present and distant, engaged with someone the viewer can neither see nor hear.  The phone adds an aural dimension to the visual mystery of  sunglasses. At the same time, like wearing jewelry or expensive clothes, talking on the phone signals status: Here is a person who is socially connected, who has friends, who is busy or important.

With cigarettes, veils, hats, and fans all more or less out of fashion, has the cell phone joined sunglasses as a glamorous essential?

["Beauty Talks" image courtesy of Piero Paravidino, Flickr user Sensitive2Light, and used with permission.]

--advertisement--

If Someone Glamorous Walked By, Would You Notice?

If you were on your cell phone, probably not. In Psychology Today Ira Hyman, Jr. reported that 75% of people walking on a path while talking on their cell phone didn’t notice someone in a clown suit ride near them on a unicycle. You might even have missed this image of Darth Vader interacting with Japanese school girls. Hyman discusses how using a cell phone absorbs our attention, just as it did for the two commercial airline pilots that flew past their airport.

Surprised to learn that while on a cell phone he had walked past one of his good friends without seeing him, Jim Nelson, editor-in-chief at GQ, wrote an editorial on what he calls “inattentional blindness.” Mentioning Hyman’s findings, Nelson writes that, “Cell phone conversations demand a different neurological engagement, causing us to create mental imagery that drowns out “the processing of real images.”

Perceiving glamour requires that we process images, because glamour is partly an act of projection. Only after some image has successfully captured our attention is it possible for us to project onto that image the aura of glamour. This can happen instantly if the image sparks our desire to be like someone, to own an article of clothing, to drive that car, and so on. We sometimes imagine our life being transformed if only this fantasy were true. Images that we find glamorous have generally been calculated to trigger such projections by showing their subjects to best advantage, without revealing messy aspects like cost, effort, and flaws.

I use a cell phone and an iPod Touch, and I find both to be great tools. But like Nelson I find it sobering to realize that the mental processes involved in using my techno gadgets may sometimes drown out my mental processing of images in the world around me.

[“Of Schoolgirls and Vader” by Flickr user karanj . Used under the Flickr Creative Commons license.]

Seeing Yourself from a Thin Perspective

My wife and I moved from the Phoenix area to Fort Collins, Colorado about four years ago. A recent Gallup Poll study reported that Fort Collins and the neighboring city of Loveland have the lowest level of obesity in the country (16%). Boulder, Colorado was number two at 16.6%. The study reported that most people in these cities practiced good health habits.

Any American city of 100,000 or more will have some people who are obese and some who are underweight. But I find living in a city where obesity is relatively uncommon to be quite a different experience. During a recent trip to Phoenix and Tucson, I saw more obese people in four days than I would likely see in six months in Fort Collins. (And Arizona cities are not among the most obese.) In a large book store in Tucson, almost half the employees struck me as obese or nearly so. In contrast, I couldn’t ever remember seeing obese employees in retail stores in Fort Collins. At a restaurant in Tucson I was stunned by the obesity of the patrons at one table. Compared to what I have become used to seeing, some of them seemed grotesque. Yet there were diners at other tables who were just as obese. I have never seen a similar situation in a Fort Collins restaurant.

A recent study found that high school girls judge their weight relative to their peer group, and I think adults do the same. We assume that the people around us provide a more realistic perspective on normal weight than do tall, thin models in magazines. So if you are overweight and hang out with other overweight people, you may feel that your weight is reasonably normal. But in a city where most people are relatively fit, this feeling is hard to sustain. If you are seriously overweight and shop in downtown Fort Collins or Boulder, you will look fat compared to most people around you.

This creates pressure to stay fit. Among our close friends, everyone does something to exercise, as well as putting some some effort into maintaining a healthy diet. Several of our friends work with personal trainers or take classes in Yoga, Pilates, or Tai Chi. All of them engage in some outdoor activities, from gardening and walking to running, bicycling, and cross-country skiing.

Does everyone in these cities work hard at fitness? Of course not. But a high percentage of them do regularly engage in physical activity. Knowing this makes it harder to make excuses for not exercising, especially when some your neighbors are amazingly fit. In my case a woman two houses down has climbed all 54 of Colorado's 14,000+ mountains. And a woman in her late sixties at the end of the block still runs marathons at 5000' elevations.

[Photo of two women on a Sunday ride in Boulder County by Let Ideas Compete. The photo of the group backpacking the Estes Park back country west of Loveland is by akeg. Both photos used under the Flickr Creative Common's license.]

Innocence versus Worldliness

Virginia’s recent post contrasting the differences between “cute” and “glamorous” made several interesting comparisons. Her distinction between “innocent, ingenue” and “worldly, sophisticated” reminded me of a lyrical poem by Richard Wilbur in which an experience of innocent beauty created an ecstatic moment for him. His poem, Piazza di Spagna, Early Morning, begins:

I can't forget
How she stood at the top of that long marble stair
Amazed, and then with a sleepy pirouette
Went dancing slowly down to the fountain-quieted square;

Nothing upon her face
But some impersonal loneliness,—not then a girl
But as it were a reverie of the place,
A called-for falling glide and whirl;

The poet witnesses a girl who, amazed by the Spanish steps in Rome, comes gliding and whirling down them, seemingly innocently unaware that she somehow completes the image of the place for the poet. Wilbur continues:

As when a leaf, petal, or thin chip
Is drawn to the falls of a pool and, circling a moment above it,
Rides on over the lip—
Perfectly beautiful, perfectly ignorant of it.

To create the lovely photograph shown at the beginning of this post, the photographer Matilde dressed herself in the kind of fairy skirt that so many young girls have played in, and she danced in her bare feet. The photograph has a wonderful feeling of innocence, but it is a portrayal of innocence created by a grown woman.

If we imagine a glamorous Italian woman descending those same stairs wearing a high-fashion gown such as the one shown here by Valentino, we assume that while she was descending she would remain perfectly aware that she was presenting herself as a beautiful, sophisticated woman.

And her awareness of her image, and the value that she knows that Western culture places on such fashionable glamour, is part of what makes her appear “dangerous,” to use Virginia’s term. She seems fully aware of the worth of her beauty and perfectly willing to use the status offered by her appearance and wealth to her full advantage.

The photograph of this gown (found on a Chinese economic site) is an illusion in that it was taken during a runway show, and the model may be wearing a gown that she herself could not afford to own. So this photograph is a portrayal of glamour designed to convince women who can afford Valentino’s gowns to purchase them. Nonetheless, I imagine this model feels glamorous while wearing this gown and walking the runway.

To see this model wear this gown and descend the Spanish steps would provide an impression as unforgettable as a girl innocently dancing down them. But where the girl presented an image of innocence, the model would present an image of glamorous worldliness.

[The photograph “As A Fairy” is copyrighted by Flickr user ♥ { ๓คtเl๔є, and is used by permission.]

--advertisement--

Video Girl Barbie and the Future of Female Body Image

There's a new Barbie on the scene, and the rest of the dolls on the shelf aren't quite sure what to make of her. She's got long blond hair and bright blue eyes, just as she always has, and a smooth, tanned, curvaceous body. And just like most Barbies you've known over the years, she loves any color as long as it's pink. But there's something different about this new doll. When you meet her, you might notice there's a special little necklace hanging just over her sternum, or as she turns to leave, that there's a flat panel screen between her scapulae. Meet Video Girl Barbie, presented to the world this week at the International Toy Fair, a kind of Flip camera with a face that Mattel promises will let you look into the world of Barbie.

There's something interesting about this notion of looking into Barbie, or looking through her. Barbie has always been a lens into a different world for girls, a glamorous teenaged or adult world full of fashion, parties, careers, and dream houses. This was, after all, the intention behind the doll as it was invented by Ruth Handler — to give girls a way to act out their fantasies and fears through imaginative play. This premise of projection was also the reason for the most controversial feature of Barbie's physicality — her breasts — because Handler felt a mature physique was essential to allowing girls to envision their future selves. The Barbie business model, with its endless parade of kits containing outfits and accessories, serves as stimulus for these projective fantasies, providing ample conduits to aspirational worlds.

It seems to me that girls have never had trouble looking into Barbie's world. Because the nature of Barbie is such that at any point in time, Barbie's world is at least partially (often mostly) in a girl's head, that world is personal and accessible. Barbie is a sketch, just defined enough to inspire a story. She's an outline to be inhabited, a room to decorate with your own desires. The doll and her things provide the form and the context; you provide motivation and narrative. Talking to friends who played with Barbies as children, the imagined scenes vary wildly, even with the same props. Some girls staged fashion shows in the Dream House while others were hosting dinner parties. Some were getting dolled up for the prom while others were making out with Ken behind the bleachers. Barbie's stories are as varied as our own because her stories are our stories. Maybe not the ones we lived, but the slightly more glamorous or dangerous ones we once wished to live. Girls see through Barbie into these fantasy worlds, and they do it effortlessly.

---

To think that such a view could enhance the fantasy of Barbie is to assume that Barbie's world is the molded plastic one Mattel produces in its factories, and not the ethereal one in the female consciousness. The most interesting things a girl sees in Barbie are not things she sees with her eyes, but with her mind.

---

Making the leap to Video Girl Barbie, a doll you look through, seems logical but oddly literal, an Amelia Bedelia kind of goof. What can you see in looking through Barbie like a periscope that you can't see with your own eyes? To think that such a view could enhance the fantasy of Barbie is to assume that Barbie's world is the molded plastic one Mattel produces in its factories, and not the ethereal one in the female consciousness. The most interesting things a girl sees in Barbie are not things she sees with her eyes, but with her mind.

Given that, this seems less a doll than a tech toy, and I imagine it will have big appeal to girls on this level. A video camera is a video camera, and it's fun regardless of the housing, though girls today are probably savvy enough that they don't need technology to be softened up with fashion in a bionic Barbie.

But the bionic nature of this doll — a strange mashup of hard tech and feminine physicality — does raise a different set of interesting questions. As we move closer to an era of post-human body modification, what kinds of new body types will emerge as aspirational? If in the past five decades Barbie has represented a standard of beauty that can be blamed with a rise in body modifications ranging from breast implants to blond highlights to anorexia to tanning, how will she evolve as a standard in a world where the available modifications are increasingly technological? Will Barbie offer a new viewpoint on the form and function of the female body as the lines between man and machine are increasingly blurred?

If these sound like imaginary inquiries better left to the world of futuristic sci-fi films, think again. Already, the field of wearable technologies is electrifying fashion, exploring ways our clothes can behave or react like smarter, more beautiful skins. Designer Hussein Chalayan is known for his avant garde work with wearables, exploring how robotic elements can create extraordinary displays of movement and light. Joanna Berzowska of XS Labs is another designer working in this space, fusing fiber and wire to create striking interactive garment-sculptures. Often these designs suggest new functions our bodies might take on in the future, like increased sensory capabilities or protective response mechanisms. The subtle displays of Ying Gao's Walking City dresses, for example, function like hypersensitive second skins, unfurling and rustling in reaction to the proximity of others. Powering many of these innovative designs is the LilyPad Arduino, a washable microcontroller that can be fully integrated into clothing, developed by Leah Buechley at MIT's Media Lab.

These are technologies worn on the body, without requiring any intrusion or permanent modification. But those innovations are coming too. Discussions of augmented-reality contact lenses are in the offing, and just this week, the New York Times reported on the development of piezoelectric body implants that would allow us to convert our bodily movements into energy that can be used to power our electronics. Already we see people who seem chained to their iPods or mobile devices — imagine if one day we actually plugged them into our skin to recharge them. Or stopped by the Apple Genius Bar for a surgical battery change?

If these potential innovations sound eerie, think about how breast implants sounded the first time you heard of them. Body modification is always unsettling, sometimes even long after it has become widespread. But all of these designs, whether worn on the body or inserted within it, are pioneering new possibilities in the shape and performance of the human physique. As we gain more power to control how our bodies look and what they do, which of these designed bodies will move towards the mainstream? Which will become new aspirational models? Will techno-bodies ever be sexy?

I don't propose that Video Girl Barbie is in any way an attempt on the part of Mattel to forge a new post-human female ideal. (The violence of the mashup — Barbie's viscera removed and replaced with a TV — would make that a vision more appropriate for R-rated horror films than Toys 'R Us.) But the juxtaposition has made me wonder what the Barbie of 2029 looks like. Will Barbie at 70 be a stunning cyborg? If we saw her today, would we think she's beautiful? Or, in an ironic twist, will Barbie's plastic figure seem nostalgically natural in comparison with our own bodies of the future?

--advertisement--

Celebrity Resemblances

I became aware of Doppelgänger Week on Facebook because my wife and I were mystified by the childhood photograph of my daughter that appeared by her name on her Facebook posts. Not recognizing it, my wife e-mailed her to ask where the photograph came from. Our daughter found this hilarious, and called to say that it was a photograph of Shirley Temple, and that she was participating in Doppelgänger Week. To the right is the photograph of Shirley Temple she used. Below is a photo of our daughter at 3½ years old.

This campaign was started by Bob Patel with this message, "It's Doppelgänger week on Facebook; change your profile picture to someone famous (actor, musician, athlete, etc.) you have been told you look like. After you update your profile with your twin or switched at birth photo then cut/paste this to your status.” I have since noticed that several Facebook friends have substituted celebrity photos. 

Psychologists could have a field day conjecturing on how and why we would openly acknowledge that we have been told we look like someone else. Surely we would not do so unless we found the association somehow positive or at least amusing. Who would choose to post a photo that acknowledges that we’ve been told we resemble someone that we ourselves find unattractive or irritating?

We are strange creatures relative to names and faces. We are predisposed to like someone who resembles a person we already know and like. And when we see a celebrity that resembles someone we dislike, we are ready to regard them with suspicion. The same thing sometimes happens with names. Of course, these initial inclinations often turn out to be ill-founded, but they seem strangely easy to form.

Perhaps the oddest thing about Doppelgänger Week was that as I saw new postings or friend requests, I was not always sure that I was looking at a photo of that person. Was there a chance I would form false impressions based on my feelings about the Doppelgänger?

Bethania Baray, one of my singer/actress Facebook friends, put up a photograph of Penelope Cruz as her doppelgänger. I can see some resemblance, but my larger impression is that both are uniquely and remarkably beautiful.

Making judgments about personality based on photographs is risky (especially with actors), but we all do it. In her photographs Bethania almost always looks like she would be “fun to be around.” Do we have the same impression of Cruz? And how much are our impressions of Cruz are colored by characters we have seen her portray in films?

[Facebook photo of Bethania Baray used with her permission.]

--advertisement--

What to Wear to the Grammy Awards?

The awards season provides various fashion spectacles, and the Grammys are usually the most outrageously flamboyant. This is especially true now that music videos and elaborately costumed stage acts have become part of the popular music business. Artists coming to the Grammys have to choose who to come as—their onstage persona, or a person glamorously dressed to attend a fancy awards ceremony.

Lady Gaga has become so known for outrageous costumes that she would risk disappointing her fans by attending in more traditional attire. Her costumes are so singularly outré that it would difficult for others to wear similar clothes without seeming to imitate her. Her Grammy costumes were on most of the worst-dressed lists that I saw on the internet, but viewing her outfits as clothing rather than as costumes misses the point. She costumes herself onstage and offstage as “Lady Gaga.” Her costumes remind me of the commedia dell’arte tradition, in which characters like Columbina wear masks and heavy makeup, as seen in the carnival photos at left and below. Like Gaga, the Columbina figure was typically portrayed as bold, experienced, and frankly erotic.

Country-western women, on the other hand, are free to dress like glamorous movie stars. Their performance costumes range from jeans to beautiful evening gowns, and in their videos they are much less prone to place themselves in surreal environments calling for surreal costumes. Taylor Swift attended in a lovely gown that would have been appropriate for the Oscar red carpet.

Rock and rap stars have an interesting problem. With some notable exceptions, their performance costumes tend to emphasize anything but fashionable haute couture clothing. They usually perform in some variation of urban street clothing, sometimes made over into something flashy for the stage. So for them to “dress-up” in a way that suggests a Vogue or GQ sense of style might seem to distance them from their fan base.

Some performers solve this problem by not trying to “dress-up” at all. Others manage to put together outfits that retain a sense of “street,” but still look stylish. Unfortunately, in other cases their efforts to “dress-up” end up making them look like night clubbers, pimps, hookers, drug dealers, or people on their way to a prom in a horrible dress or tux. Others, such as Rihanna, have a personal interest in high fashion, and use awards ceremonies as a reason to wear their finest. All of the women mentioned can be seen in the following video:

[Photo of the bird couple by Nahlinse. Photo of the masked woman by Alaskan Dude. Both used under the Flickr Creative Commons License.]

--advertisement--

Achieving Elegance

In trying to achieving an elegant effect suitable to a situation, there are many ways to go wrong. At one end there are  possibilities that suggest we made insufficient effort. These can range from a sense that we made no effort (wearing rumpled “around the house” clothes) to being underdressed or out-of-style relative to the occasion and everyone else.

There are also many ways to “try too hard” or show questionable taste: ranging from overdone glitz to being decades out of style. Ever since Liberace took glitz over the top in Las Vegas, some entertainers have confused glitz with glamour. This photo of Elvis Presley in his gold lamé tux exemplifies how show-biz costumes can become outrageously glitzy. Such costumes inevitably crossover into kitsch when wore offstage (whatever you think of them onstage).

One of the widely acknowledged exemplars of elegance was the appropriately named Grace Kelly, show in the above photograph at left. You can find several articles on the web discussing how to look or dress like her, and the emphasis is often on a certain simplicity in clothing design, jewelry, color choices, and use of makeup.

On the other hand, “elegance” implies more than mere simplicity. Dictionary definitions of “elegance” often include the word “pleasingly.” For example: “pleasingly graceful and stylish in appearance or manner,” or, relative to solving a problem, “pleasingly ingenious and simple.” As Albert Einstein said about science, “Make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler.”

This is one of the great quandaries of style in many fields, including fashion, art, and writing. If you want your work to be elegant, you have to do enough to create a pleasing effect; otherwise you will have failed to achieve your aim. In fashion, true elegance can be stunning in effect. Thus effects that are dowdy, shoddy, or just plain dull fail to qualify.

On the other hand, once you have done enough to achieve an elegant effect, adding elements that seem extraneous can weaken the sense of artful simplicity.

Jessica Biel, a beautiful woman, wore the Prada dress shown at left to the 2009 Oscars. The bow on the front was widely criticized as looking sloppy and extraneous, and some critics were surprised that the normally elegant Prada seemed to have  miscalculated in this instance. Yet the outfit cannot be faulted as glitzy became the color scheme and jewelry are so classic and restrained.

For those of us who feel the bow looks “added on,” rather than ingeniously integrated, it is a single design flaw, but nonetheless regrettable in that we feel that we might have admired the dress without the bow. In contrast the addition of rhinestones to Elvis’s gold lamé tuxedo is of little consequence. The gold lamé has already pushed the concept of a formal tux so far into glitz-ville that some extra sparkle just turns it into extreme kitsch—gold lamé made superbly lame.

--advertisement--

When Fashion Meets Political Function

[Editor’s Note: With this post, DG intern Crystal Hubbard, an aspiring television writer and organizer of the L.A. chapter of Liberty on the Rocks, joins our writing crew.]

“A woman must continually watch herself. She is almost continually accompanied by her own image…” wrote art critic John Berger in his text on visual culture, Ways of Seeing. Berger’s perception hinges on the word “must,” implying that there is something inescapable about the female vigilance to appearance; something within her psyche that compels a woman to preen and then guard the finished product.

But it is one thing for a woman to watch herself at trivial and mundane events (though she will) and a completely different matter when she has committed herself to public service. Suddenly, a decision to wear (or not wear) X-item becomes a clue as to how she will vote, how she will govern, how she will wield power.

When Senator Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.) announced she would support the Senate’s motion to keep health care reform legislation alive, her historic decision—Lincoln’s was the last, and necessary, vote to further debate—was marked not with an accompanying dossier of accomplishments, but by what she was wearing. A relative unknown, Licoln chose to make her biggest senatorial moment into something almost not worth mentioning. “Her attire was school-principal prim—blue suit with knee-length skirt, orange silk scarf tied tightly at the neck,” wrote the WaPo's Dana Millbank. A meekly feminine showing, at best.

One has to wonder why she chose something so uninspired. A more memorable ensemble would have communicated that Lincoln realized she had climbed to the pinnacle of power, and had seized the national spotlight with an outfit worthy of the moment.

"My decision to vote on the motion to proceed is not my last, nor only, chance to have an impact on health-care reform," Lincoln said, having outlasted all the other pork-barrel beggars, and as Millbank noted, “She took a streetcar named Opportunism, transferred to one called Wavering and made off with concessions…”

If there is further motive—Lincoln is sure to remind her party, in the coming weeks of debate and deal making, of her solidifying vote—her propriety now becomes suspect. Following Berger’s observation to its logical conclusion, this may turn out to be only a penultimate moment for the senator from Arkansas, who gave a major piece of legislation a much-needed second wind, and may show up in something significantly more eye-catching the next time Harry Reid is found holding his breath.

 In his same essay, Berger also said, “men act, and women appear.” Which helps explain why fashion plays a less important role in the career of a male politico. Men are physically imposing without having to adorn themselves, and powerful just by being. If a man fails in the fashion—or appearance—department, we do not automatically question his judgment or ability to govern. We merely chastise him for not being mindful of the moment.

During a 2005 visit to Auschwitz to commemorate the liberation of Jewish prisoners, then-Vice President Dick Cheney sported an ill-advised parka, that, as Pulitzer Prize winner Robin Givhan wrote, made him look “like an awkward child amid the well-dressed adults.” Former interim UN Ambassador John Bolton also received the Givhan treatment during his hastily made-up appearance before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, in the days leading up to his failed (permanent) appointment as Ambassador.

…when he settled in before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee this week to answer questions about his record, his philosophy and his intentions at the U.N., he looked as though he did not even have enough respect for the proceedings to bother combing his hair -- or, for that matter, straightening his tie, or wearing a shirt that did not put his neck in a chokehold. Bolton was one wrinkled suit away from being an insolent mess.

For men, we playfully mock and move on; for women, we analyze and critique ad nauseum. It’s one thing for Dick Cheney to look as though he should be clearing the driveway at Number One Observatory Circle; it’s another to say that since a woman looks like she could be the offspring of Tammy Faye Bakker we should question her political acumen. When the contentious results of the 2000 presidential election put Katherine Harris in charge, fair or not, the nation took one collective look and said, “Uh oh.”

We react this way because we count on women to “continually watch” themselves. And if our elected women aren't watching, if they too are schlepping around their closets like the worst of the boys, then they are—whether they know it or not—signaling that they are an aberration, out of touch with what it means to be a woman, and negligent of one of their most sacred weapons: themselves.

--advertisement--

MadMen Contest: Where Were the Secretaries?

Banana Republic sponsored a photo competition for people dressed in the style of the TV show MadMen. The prize is a walk-on role for an episode of the show, and the semifinalists and now the winner have been announced. Among the semifinalist photos we see portraits of wives and airline stewardesses, but secretaries (now titled “administrative assistants”) and interns seem underrepresented.

In imagining a walk-on role, a temporary secretary or someone interviewing to be an intern would seem to have great potential. Such a walk-on role could be little or no dialogue, and a lovely young woman could provide eye candy for the show’s viewers. Surely a lot of contestants felt this would be the case and submitted photos of themselves as secretaries. One of these is shown at right.

An attractive, unattached female is inevitably the focus of considerable male attention in an office, even if it is limited to looking and fantasizing. The image at right captures such a moment marvelously. The woman who is the subject of her boss’s admiring appraisal no doubt realizes that he will study her figure as she walks away, and she accepts it, though from her expression we can’t tell whether she welcomes it or not.

Back before issues of sexual harassment made office relationships more hazardous, secretaries were often involved in affairs with their bosses or other men in the office. So I find it surprising that photos of secretaries didn’t turn up in the semi-finalists. However, the semi-finalists and winners were determined by public voting, which always make the outcome of a contest unpredictable.  A long-standing issue for the TV show Dancing with the Stars has been how its predominately female viewers vote. After the first few seasons the producers feared that no woman contestant would ever win because so many women viewers seemed to simply vote for the man they would most like to have as their dance partner.

The winning MadMen photo is shown at left, and an interview with winner Porter Hovey can be found here. Hovey is a freelance photographer, and she and her sister staged the photo. She portrays a well-dressed suburban mom, sunglasses and all, who is sitting on the steps next to her vintage stroller. One of the questions her interviewer asks is whether she sees herself as a Marilyn or a Jackie, though there doesn’t seem much doubt which one she emulates in the photo.

Contests in which the winner is whoever crosses the line first are easy to understand. The same with sports like basketball where points are scored when the ball goes through the hoop, and the team with the most points wins.

Contests involving subjective judgments are often puzzling. Looking at the photos of the men who are semi-finalists, only the first had a suggestion of narrative. The rest seem like straightforward photos—no feeling of story. Some of the women’s photos are more interesting in a narrative sense, particularly the first, the last, and the winner. In these, the women are seen in staged action. Surely that made a difference in how voters were able to relate to photos.

Perhaps the majority of voters in this contest were women, and if so I can imagine them relating to a wife with responsibilities who is forced to wait for someone, perhaps her late-as-usual husband. A scene like this invites us to imagine what the story is. The photo looks like it could be a genuine street shot, and people were actually stopping and peeking in to see the baby (which turned out to be camera gear).

It would be interesting to know the demographics of the voters. Did women vote for images of women that they identified with? Returning to the lack of secretary photos among the semifinalists, were women voters  less inclined to vote for images of women who look as if they might put a married man’s fidelity to the test? I didn’t vote, but as a male I confess that I understood why the man in the first photo was mesmerized.

[Photo of the woman in blue is from Suchacyn’s Flicker Photostream, and is used by permission.]

--advertisement--

Geek Glamour

Sergey Brin, one of the co-founders of Google and ranked by Forbes as the 26th richest man in the world, recently took part in the announcement of Google’s Chrome OS. A number of internet sites have shown more interest in Brin’s footwear and choice of smart phones than in the Chrome announcement.

John Biggs at CrunchGear labels Brin’s footwear as “crazy monkey shoes,” but he also describes how these shoes solved all kinds of problems he himself had been having as a runner. On the other hand, he writes “They definitely make you look like a freak. However, I suspect the sting of scorn and ridicule is dampened a bit by the fact that the man has billions and billions of dollars. In my case, people just laugh at me when I run, and I cry. The sweat hides the tears.”

Matt Buchanan at Gizmodo is likewise fascinated by Brin’s footwear, but he also notes that he “carries a Motorola Droid, not a super secret phone we’ve never seen before.” His post has a fascinating photo of participants taking notes on their various gizmos. Most are using smart phones, one person is holding two devices, and one is using a Moleskine notebook and a fountain pen. Judging from these photographs, geek glamour is more about owning and using the “right tools” then wearing high-fashion clothing, no matter how rich you are.

Brin does have unusual taste in footwear, having before been photographed in Crocs (his choice to wear at the US Tennis Open). And, speaking pragmatically, when you’re working obsessively on a project, there’s something to be said for clothes that look much the same whether you’ve slept in them or not.

Pretty Celebrities Sell Magazines: In Defense of Newsweek's Sarah Palin Cover

I am generally bored by the hysteria, pro and con, that surrounds Sarah Palin. As a bona fide coastal elitist intellectual snob, I can’t see voting for her. But neither do I share the visceral hatred for her or her fans. (Megan McArdle dubs it Palinoia.) I consider her intelligent but ignorant and unworldly. I even liked her convention speech.

That said, the flap over the Newsweek cover shot is as ridiculous as it is predictable. I’ve read enough comment threads over the years to know that conservatives regularly make a point of proudly declaring that their female icons are good looking compared to the old hags on the other side. When did they suddenly adopt politically correct second-wave feminist attitudes toward female beauty, even in the public sphere? 

Like it or not, Sarah Palin’s good looks are a big part of her superwoman appeal: governor, earth mother, and sportswoman, with a pretty face and a great body despite all those pregnancies. Besides, I seem to recall some widely circulated topless beach shots of the current commander-in-chief. (Not to mention Condi Rice strutting in those great black boots.) There’s no double standard, except for the one that says if you have bad legs, we don't want to see you in shorts.

There are, of course, problems with the photo, which was taken for Runner's World and was supposed to be embargoed for a year. Nonetheless, it’s clear what Newsweek editors were thinking when they picked it: This is going to sell magazines. (The controversy is a bonus. Free publicity!) Journalism is in survival mode. This is not a time to get squeamish about using the most commercial photo available. 

The cries that the cover is “sexist” assume two things: First, that women in public life should not be portrayed as consciously, proudly, sexily attractive. Male politicians can be obviously good looking, but conspicuously attractive women aren’t sufficiently serious. (Maybe we’ll make an exception if you look sufficiently high-end WASP.) And, second, that Newsweek doesn’t like Sarah Palin—an assumption borne out by its cover headline. With different editorial framing, the photo would be read differently. (Pardon my bad mockup. I only had PowerPoint and a very balky iPhoto retouch function to work with.)

I do have one question: Is she wearing panty hose?

--advertisement--

Woman at a Mirror: The Glamour of the Toilette

Recently up for auction, this Edward Quinn photo of Grace Kelly primping during the filming of To Catch a Thief presents an usual take on a common artistic subject: the beautiful woman at the mirror. From such classics as Diego Velázquez’s Rokeby Venus and Kitagawa Utamaro’s portraits of beauties at their mirrors to this Mark Shaw photo of Audrey Hepburn, the usual composition uses the mirror to give the audience multiple views of the subject: front and back, the face from different angles, the woman as she sees herself and as she is seen by others.

Here, however, we see Grace Kelly entirely from the outside. We do not see the reflection she sees. Rather than a woman of fragments and angles, she appears in a unified view. The photo is a study of surfaces and textures: the shiny, soft hair she is brushing, the lacy gloves, the ornate top, the golden down on her tan arm, the shiny mirror overlaid on the dull trailer. The focal point, framed by her crossed arms is Grace’s face, made even more focal because we know she, too, is looking at it.

The glamour of the toilette points up the difference between male and female audiences (or, to use a phrase encrusted with all sorts of ideological theory, the male and female gaze). For male audiences, portraits of women grooming themselves have traditionally had a voyeuristic quality and were often an excuse for nudity. Projecting himself into the image, the viewer does not generally identify with the subject but with the scene; he imagines not being the subject but being with her. A female viewer is more likely to identify with the subject. She sees herself in the mirror—or longs to.

That feeling was articulated by many of the movie fans interviewed by Jackie Stacey for her study Star Gazing: Hollywood Cinema and Female Spectatorship. Recalling their youthful filmgoing in the 1940s, women expressed longing and identification when talking about the stars they loved. “It wasn’t Ginger Rogers dancing with Fred Astaire, it was me,” said one. Another said, “My favourite was Rita Hayworth. I always imagined if I could look like her I could toss my red hair into the wind…and meet the man of my dreams.”

For women in particular, there is a second kind of glamour of the toilette: the makeover fantasy, which combines the desire for transformation with the idea of being pampered by professionals. “It’s exciting to have important people do stuff for you,” said a nurse from rural Arkansas on ABC’s Extreme Makeover. Hollywood stars not only represent the promise of beauty and fame but also—thanks to their squadrons of makeup artists, hair stylists, wardrobe designers, and, nowadays, everyday fashion stylists—the dream of having an aesthetic entourage on call.

--advertisement--

Virtuosity and Beauty: A Precarious Mix?

The cryptic phrase “Virtuosity is some evidence of virtue,” occurs in Deirdre McCloskey’s book, The Rhetoric of Economics. Virtue aside, virtuosity is clearly evidence of commitment and hard work. In his book The Talent Code Daniel Coyle describes how repeated, focused practice of specific skills causes the involved neural pathways to be insulated with myelin, ultimately making these pathways as much as 3,000 times more efficient. He repeats what I have read elsewhere, that the usual amount of deep practice necessary to master a difficult sport or musical instrument at a virtuoso level is roughly 10,000 hours or about 10 years. Getting 10,000 hours of practice in ten years would mean spending an average of 2.75 hours every day in deep, focused practice. To do it in fewer years would require more hours of practice each day. Whether we are discussing playing an instrument, playing soccer, skateboarding, or playing tennis, a huge investment of time is required to become a virtuoso player or performer.

One long-term study of music students revealed the factor that most determined their long-term achievement was their initial feeling about how long they would continue to play their instrument. Those that progressed the most assumed they would continue to play their whole lives. This sense of commitment was key to achieving deep concentration when they were practicing, which is crucial to the development of these super-efficient neural pathways.

Coyle also reports that the inspiration to make such a powerful commitment typically comes from outside ourselves. If we see someone who has become successful in a field, then we might imagine that if we worked hard enough, then perhaps we too could be successful. When golfer Se Ri Pak (shown at right) came to the U.S. tour in 1998, she was the only Korean woman, but her extraordinary success inspired others. Ten years later there were 45 Korean women on the tour, and articles were being written about it was that they had come to dominate professional golf. This 2007 article is particularly interesting, discussing the discipline and purpose Korean families expect from children that show some talent. (Korea is also providing some of the best prepared young pianists and violinists.) Obviously, some native ability is required, but it is hard to imagine practicing your skills for 10,000 hours without having seen an example of what all those hours of practice might allow you to do.

In that sense, a sports star can become a glamorous figure to others because the star has achieved the level of mastery that they aspire to attain. But in our media-rich world, if a sports star happens to combine top-level skills and physical attractiveness, then they become even more valuable to sponsors, who hope to capitalize on the star’s commercial appeal. Some examples of sports figures whose looks have made their images highly marketable include David Beckham, Tom Brady, Andre Agassi, Rafael Nadal, Anna Kournikova, and Maria Sharapova (shown in the first photograph above introducing a line of Canon cameras). Sharapova is thought to make considerably more money with endorsements than she does by playing tennis.

Tina Fey: Funny, but Glamorous?

In the November 2009 issue of Harper's Bazaar, Tina Fey trades in Liz Lemon's schlumpy cardigans for several seriously gorgeous designer cocktail dresses. They say that the clothes make the man, but in this case, I wonder.

On the subscriber cover (at left), in white Yves Saint Laurent, Fey looks pretty. But she also looks awkward, like a jockish girl all dressed up for a high school dance. Like she can't wait for the shoot to end so she can wash her face and get back into her baggy jeans. It just doesn't feel like Tina Fey. But it's a fashion magazine, so she's in a dress.

Inside, Fey admits that she's not really much for dressing up and that Liz Lemon, the character she based on her early years as a writer in NYC, "has little to no style."  She also admits that Lemon's character could use a little more confidence.

This Bazaar cover just looks all wrong to me. But what I wonder is this: who's responsible for that? Should Bazaar have dialed down the glam factor, dressing Fey in something more comfortable and familiar? Or is Fey selling herself short by not totally owning that dress?

[Harper's Bazaar cover image by Alexi Lubomirski.]

--advertisement--

DG Q&A: Plastic Surgeon Haideh Hirmand, M.D.

I met Haideh Hirmand at a dinner party given by the amazing Joan Kron (interviewed here) and was immediately impressed with her elegance and insight. A board-certified plastic surgeon in Manhattan, she is an active researcher as well as a practitioner and has a particular interest some of her field’s most precise and delicate procedures: those surrounding the eyes. (Typical research article titles: “Beyond The Tear Trough: An Anatomic Basis for Aesthetic Rejuvenation of the Peri-orbital Area,” and “Patient Safety in Eyelid Rejuvenation.”) Surgery or injections around the eyes are both medically demanding—there’s little margin for error—and aesthetically challenging, since tiny alterations can change the entire look of a person’s face. Patients come to her for her knowledge and skills, of course, but, observed Julia Reed in a 2006 Vogue profile, “it is Hirmand’s matter-of-factness that her patients prize.” We’re delighted she took the time to answer our questions.

DG: What drew you to plastic surgery as a specialty?

HH: The diversity of procedures, the rapidly evolving technology, the strong aesthetic angle, together with the emphasis on creativity and details at the same time. In addition, the possibilities to encompass international work and most importantly the fact that the psyche and the motivation of the person are just as important as the physical indications in planning and treatment.  

DG: What are patients hoping for when they come to you? How realistic are they?

HH: It really depends on the patient. They are hoping to look better but in reality this means that they are hoping to feel better. Part of my job is to identify those who will not feel better even if they look better objectively.

DG: What misperceptions do patients have about plastic surgery? How about non-patients?

HH: The biggest one is that there will be “no scars.” And some think that plastic surgery is a substitute for a good attitude and can make them happy. This is a big misconception and can lead to a lot of disappointment.

---

“Aging gracefully” means different things to different people. To some it means never doing anything to interfere with nature’s course, and for others it means doing everything to prevent nature from taking its toll so that they age gracefully!

---

As for non-patients, the biggest misconception I have come across is that plastic surgery somehow preys on people’s desires to be young and beautiful.

DG: In stating your practice’s philosophy, you say, “The objective is to maintain elegance regardless of age.”  What makes for elegance?

HH: Good taste, an attitude, a language

DG: What do you think of the ideal of “aging gracefully”?

HH: “Aging gracefully” means different things to different people. To some it means never doing anything to interfere with nature’s course and for others it means doing everything to prevent nature from taking its toll so that they age gracefully! I believe everyone has to find their own definition of “aging gracefully” that she or he feels comfortable with.

DG: Are there any new techniques or technologies you're particularly excited about?

HH: I am excited about the newer liposuction technologies. I am an investigator for the FDA study for a radiofrequency based liposuction device, called BodyTite, and we are evaluating its efficacy for skin tightening. There are also ultrasonic noninvasive body-contouring technologies coming down the pipeline. If we can make them work safely, it will revolutionize the field.

For the breast, we have newer tools like dermal matrices, such as Alloderm and the newer Strattice to help with secondary corrections and reconstruction.

On the eyelid and facial front, where I have always maintained a strong interest and subspecialty, it is amazing to learn more about the process of facial aging and to further evolove the techniques to nonsurgically rejuvenate the lower lid with fillers to get rid of the “sunken look.” There will be novel fillers and topicals that can intercept aging in many new ways. But the most exciting thing for me is practicing in an era where I can combine surgery and noninvasive tools in the right dose, for each person for the best results, something that was just not available to my mother’s generation years ago.

The DG Dozen

1) How do you define glamour? Glamour, to me, is a “presence” that is both stunningly attractive and inspirational. A quality that is not limited to physical appearance but encompasses attitude, behavior, and life.

2) Who or what is your glamorous icon?  Grace Kelly 

The “Myth” of French Glamour

In honor of glamorous Frenchwoman Catherine Deneuve’s 66th birthday (which is today), I have a question: What is it about French women that is just so glamorous? And how can I get some of it?

I ask myself that question more frequently than I should probably admit – every time I painstakingly wrap a scarf around my neck or throw on a striped, boatneck shirt in an effort to grab a little of the nonchalant chic that French women seem to be born with.

I’m hardly the first frustrated American woman to ask that question. Last January in the New York Post, writer Maureen Callahan posed the question, albeit in a snarkier tone, in her article, “French Women Can Suck It.” In an effort to uncover the roots of the myth that “French women are better than we are,” Callahan interviewed a couple of legitimately glamorous French women, both of whom hedged a little when asked about French glamour.

Mireille Giuliano, author of the French Women Don't Get Fat books and president and CEO of Veuve Cliquot, Inc., says that it’s not really all French women who appear so glamorous, it’s just the Parisians. And they’ve got American counterparts in New York. (Full FTC-approved disclosure: I once received a signed copy of one of the French Women books, along with a very nice handwritten note from Ms. Giuliano, thanking me for something complimentary I’d written about the books. Glamour or no, I was charmed.)

Callahan also spoke with Garance Dore, a Paris-based street style photographer-blogger (and girlfriend to Scott “The Sartorialist” Schuman). Dore said, “For me, the French woman is a nice and beautiful myth.”

Both Giuliano and Dore seemed eager to assure their American fans that the “French” thing can be overcome. That there’s no glamour gene that exists only in French DNA. The thing is, while both praise the confidence, style, and attitude of American women (especially New Yorkers), I’m pretty sure they both believe that French women have something special in the glamour department.

At the beginning of her second book, French Women for All Seasons, Giuliano writes about the reaction the first book generated among her French female friends. In short, they were outraged. She quotes one, who said, “How dare you give away OUR secrets to the world?” This was specifically said with respect to “not getting fat,” but the books are really about the way of life that keeps French women famously trim – and glamorous. Somebody in Giuliano’s circle, at least, believes that French women have a corner on the fabulous market.

Garance Dore’s story is similarly murky. Just a few weeks before the NY Post article ran, Dore was interviewed by New York-based writer Joanna Goddard. The subject? How Goddard could stick to her New Year’s resolution to “dress like a French woman.” Dore gave a real, and thorough, answer, involving stripes, scarves, “unconcious layering,” an aversion to color, laziness, and an appreciation for the “sexy detail” (though it seems to me that “sexy detail” is pretty vague…and probably where a lot of American women get caught up). Gore also shared this:

The French woman doesn’t take any resolutions. The French woman is. The present is her sole religion. In fact, the mystery behind the French woman is that she has confidence in herself, despite all the nonsense she says. There’s the secret to her indestructible Frenchitude.

So there it is. French women – from Deneuve to Dore – do share a secret. And, unfortunately for us Yanks, even when it’s spelled out, it’s vague. Guess it’s back to scarf-tying class for me.

[Photo of the Eiffel Tower at dusk, the ultimate glamorous building, by Flickr user stevenvanwel. Used under the Creative Commons license.]

--advertisement--

Cosplay Visions

This Japanese vision in pink and white is engaged in cosplay (costume play) in Tokyo near Harajuku station. Virginia wrote about cosplay and the glamour of dressing up in July. In Tokyo many girls and young women engage in cosplay on Sundays, and are happy to pose for photographs. This Little Bo Peep costume has some interesting details: she is wearing a crown necklace and a giant costume jewelry ring. This has historical implications because Western royalty also used to masquerade. She is referencing not just a nursery rhyme, but also the history of costume play.

One of the most famous costume players was Marie Antoinette, whose husband Louis XVI gave her a fake hamlet called Hameau de la Reine within the park of Versailles. There Marie gained a fantasy setting for her costume play, complete with docile, well-cleaned livestock, and porcelain milk pails. Here the Queen and her attendants could play at being elaborately dressed shepherdesses and milkmaids.

In 18th-century England nobles loved to attend balls masquerading as sumptuously costumed rural characters. Anti-masquerade clergymen felt that no moral woman should attend one. Nonetheless, the masquerades became so popular that conservatives warned that suggesting that the difference between nobles and peasants was a matter of appearance was a danger to the established social order. As Terry Castle writes in Masquerade and Civilization: The Carnivalesque in Eighteenth-Century English Culture and Fiction :

The anti-masquerade rhetoric of the period offered a clue to the masquerade’s ultimate demise when it exposed the masquerade as a threat to bourgeois decorum and rationalist taxonomies. Mask and costume, the signs of a joyful exchange between self and other, had to be laid aside, and more sober pursuits embraced.

In Japan another popular cosplay character is Lolita, and she is often costumed in Goth black. The young woman shown here blowing bubbles evokes both childhood innocence and a seductive nymphet. The bow on her head seems girlish, but the Goth clothing and the black-cross necklace seem more witch-like. Perhaps the iridescent bubbles she is conjuring are charmed, and have the power to bewitch.

Nabokov’s novel provides no more basis that Lolita should wear black than the nursery rhyme does that Little Bo Peep would dress in pinks and whites. And, clearly, no real-life shepherdess wore fancy clothes while tramping about with her sheep. But this is costume play, and so it is rightfully playful.

The cosplay characters sometimes overlap. A parasol is usually part of the Little Bo Peep costume, but this young woman glancing back from beneath her black parasol suggests a combination of shepherdess, Goth, and Lolita. Her features are still somewhat child-like, but the costume and makeup are grown up and provocative. This unexpected mixture is part of the charm of the costume, and, with her appraising gaze, this Little Bo Peep/Lolita looks dangerously sexually precocious.

These elaborate costumes involve significant expenditures of time and money. And, as all of these photos show, these young women act the roles they are portraying. As Virginia has written, the chance to participate in cosplay, to be noticed, to stand out, and to be photographed is a social activity these young ladies find richly rewarding.

I imagine that these young women gain poise from cosplay that carries over into their everyday lives. Playing someone other than themselves may genuinely expand their sense of self. Terry Castle wrote that the 18th-century masquerades were “a profound mingling of opposites, an absorptive, endlessly satisfying embrace of self and other.”

(The "Harajuku girl" photo is by jaybergesen, and is used under the Flickr Creative Commons license. The "Lolita" photograph is by Bryan Campbell, and is used by permission. The "Glance" photo is by Tommy Cuellar and is used by permission.)

--advertisement--

Visualizing Photographic Results

One of my father’s best friends in college became a professional studio photographer, and more than once he practiced his glamour-shot skills using my father as his model (as seen at left). I have numerous photos of my father taken with elaborate studio lighting, usually smoking a cigarette or pipe, sometimes bare-chested, and almost always looking intense. His friend, the photographer, clearly was in charge of the photo sessions, and knew the various looks that he wanted. In a few of these photographs my father was directed to scowl, and in those he can look quite frightening.

Few of us have had occasion to be photographed in a situation where we are there to serve the photographer’s desire to add images to his portfolio. If we hire a professional photographer, it is typically to create a personal or family portrait, or record an occasion such as a wedding or graduation. Even in this situation, the photographer typically exerts a great deal of control relative to the outcome, using experience to produce results that will please most customers.

This is typically the situation with high school yearbook pictures, and I have used my own to illustrate. So that everyone would conform, the photographer had a supply of different-sized white jackets on hand. Since no high school girl would want a single wrinkle to show, the studio was set up with soft lighting. In contrast, the harder lighting used for my father’s portrait shows every wrinkle on his face.

Adding to the softness of the yearbook portrait is the relatively narrow depth of field. My right eye is in sharp focus, but my hair, right shoulder, and ears are not. Compare the sharp focus of my father’s hair with the soft focus of mine. The wider depth of field used for my father’s portrait allows the hair on his arms to be as sharply focused as his eyes.

The softer look is often felt to be more flattering, as it tends to make skin look smoother. But in my father’s portrait the sharp focus and harder lighting creates a sense of frankness that is clearly  what the photographer intended. The crucial point is that both images are partly illusions that the photographer created by his choices of lighting, depth of field, and direction. As I recall I was told to tilt my head and look slightly to the side of the camera, whereas my father’s gaze is inescapably direct.

To get a sense of trying to visualize results, imagine what I might have looked like in the conditions used to photograph my father, and then imagine him photographed as in my yearbook photo. Doing so is not easy, but it’s an interesting exercise. Another is to look through a fashion magazine, see if the models’ eyes reflect the location of a main light source, and, if so, then look for the shadows cast by that light. Asking such “what if?” and “how did they light this?” questions can help us understand how various photographic effects were achieved, and possibly how to better achieve them ourselves.

--advertisement--

Glamour Flashback: Nixon-Kennedy Televison Debates

This Saturday is the 49th anniversary of the first presidential debate between John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon. The debate marks a turning point in American political history—the point when television caught up with (and surpassed) newspapers and the radio as the most influential element media through which to campaign.

Nixon famously underestimated the visual power of TV. He refused makeup, against the advice of his television advisor, Ted Rogers, even though he'd just regained health after a two-week illness. As a result, he appeared tired and run-down.

Kennedy, on the other hand, was the picture of health, tanned and ready after campaigning in California—a "bronze warrior," as Rogers described him. The perfect picture of mid-century strength, youth, and masculine glamour.

The radio audience considered Nixon the winner, but unfortunately for Nixon, that moment coincided with a shift in the public's behavior. Kennedy's youth and vigor appealed to the television audience, who thought he won the debate.

The momentum Kennedy picked up at that first debate proved too much for Nixon, in 1960, anyway. The lesson Nixon learned the hard way - never underestimate the visual impact of health and glamour—was burned in every rising politico's brain.

In recent years, we've seen another shift in media and glamour, as the particular charms of the Internet force candidates to learn how to respond quickly and effectively to a constituent base made up of citizen journalists. Being able to adeptly manage messages is even more difficult now than it was in 1960. But the importance of glamour is still there—just ask will.i.am. Even today, politicians hope to capture the healthy, young, exciting energy that Kennedy so effortlessly projected back in September 1960.

A look at the Nixon/Kennedy debates and the impact they had on the election:

--advertisement--

Footwear as Fashion Indicators

Recently I found myself with time to kill in a area of Denver where there are several courthouses and high-rise office buildings. I decided to sit in a Starbucks and spend some time observing the clothing of the steady parade of customers.

Some clothing served as markers of high-status positions. The men in expensive shoes and suits were most likely connected to nearby law firms or corporate offices. Yet their clothing sometimes reflected more than business seriousness. Some of the men clearly relished looking great, right up to their impeccably cut and combed hair.

To give my observations some coherence, I decided to focus on footwear. Years ago I heard an art dealer mention footwear as one of the gauges you could use to judge people’s willingness to spend money on themselves. The premise was that if a potential customer had spent money on stylish footwear, they were also more likely to spend money buying art. Since then, several retailers of luxury goods have told me that they have learned to be careful about jumping to conclusions based on appearance. People often dress quite casually while relaxing or on vacation, and there are people with money who don't like to dress up.

Nonetheless, we all make make assumptions based on first impressions, and a salesperson in an jewelry store will instinctively notice when someone enters the store wearing nice jewelry. So while I was observing the diverse clothing styles of the Starbucks customers, I decided to see if looking first at people’s footwear would usually provide a quick indication of both the expense and style of what I would see when I looked higher.

In general this proved to be the case. Dressy shoes predicted dressy clothes, casual shoes predicted casual clothes, and so on. Nonetheless, there were enough subtle variations to keep things interesting. Casual footwear varied in stylishness over a vast range, and these variations also tended to reflect the wearer’s fashion look.

Even flip-flops varied widely. There were some decorated ones, though I saw none of the hand-decorated Swarovski crystal variety, such as those available on the internet here and here. (The latter site even offers a collection of bridal flip flops.) Fun flip flops styles generally went with fashions that were fun and looked comfortable to wear.

Footwear that exposes bare feet has been and remains a subject of debate as office wear. I saw only three women in business attire who wore flip flops, and in each case their business wear was relatively casual, and their flip flops were black and sleek, which made them look something like sandals. The women that wore them were young and appeared to be lower level employees. (I was reminded of the business maxim, “dress for the job you want, not the job you have.”)

While observing I also noticed that footwear and attire were sometimes used either to attract attention or seemingly to avoid attention. For example, two young women came in together, obviously from the same office. One had on black flip-flops and the other wore stylish three-inch heels. The flip-flop wearer had on a loose white blouse worn outside a knee-length, loose brown skirt. Nothing about her clothing called attention to her body, which was thin, but also rather shapeless. In contrast, the young woman wearing the stylish high-heels had on a black dress which, while still office appropriate, was short enough to showcase her remarkably beautiful legs. There were a lot of customers, and when she left Starbucks every man there turned to watch her walk away. She clearly knew the value of her legs, and had directed attention to them. And, like the stylishly dressed businessmen, she seemed to relish knowing that she looked great.

The lyrics of the above 1980s No Nonsense commercial say, “If the attitude fits, wear it.” Yet sometimes wearing different clothing can substantially influence our here-and-now attitude about ourselves. So  perhaps the saying should sometimes be, “If you want an attitude, wear it.”

[Business suit photograph used by permission of jjwam, whose Flickr photostream is here. The "pink flip flops" photo is by cambodia4kidsorg, and used under the Flickr Creative Commons License.]

--advertisement--

Hotel Week: Miami & Looking Beyond the Glamour

Virginia's post about the hotel industry’s perpetual promises to “bring glamour back” reminded me of my recent trip to Miami—a city that was originally built, and then renovated, with glamour in mind.

To my eye, though, the city is full of reminders that glamour is often only skin-deep. At first glance, Miami is gorgeous. The people are fabulous, wearing dramatic (and tiny) clothes that would never fly in most American cities, and the architecture harkens back to a long-ago era when cocktail hour started promptly at 5 p.m. and jeans weren’t considered acceptable dinner attire.

Look closer, though, and the glamour fades away. As I walked around the city, I kept thinking of that line from Clueless, “She’s a full-on Monet. From far away, it’s OK, but up close, it's a big old mess.” “Big old mess” might be an exaggeration, but looking closely at glamorous people and places often reveals the flaws and strain under the façade.

The photo above was taken by my friend (and future sister-in-law), Marcail, during our trip—it’s one of the banquettes at LIV, the nightclub at the Fontainebleu hotel. Marcail took the shot to remember the club's “atmosphere,” but I think it tells a bigger story about Miami and about a lot of what we perceive as “glamorous.” Glamour is often shiny on the surface, but marred with rips and tears that expose the rough underneath.

On a banquette, the tears are literal and in a building, they might be dingy paint or scuffed floors—all easily fixed. But when it’s a glamorous persona that comes under scrutiny, the discrepancy between the surface and what’s beneath is sometimes more serious—think Marilyn Monroe or Britney Spears a few years ago. In those cases, maintaining the glamorous image adds strain that widens the gap between façade and reality even more.

[Photo credit: Marcail Moran, who says that she and her stilettos are at least partially responsible for one of those rips.]

---advertisement---

DG Contest: Now You Know How...To Blow Dry Your Hair

This little guy seems to have no lack of confidence, but many of us feel a bit overwhelmed when faced with the supposedly simple task of blow-drying our hair. The blow dryer too often seems like a tool designed to be used by multi-armed Shivas or at least third parties with professional training.

Help is on the way: Kimberly Clo's DIY DVD, Now You Know How... To Blow Dry Your Hair, which offers step-by-step instructions in what one reviewer calls Clo's "unpretentious delivery and warm, soothing Earth Mother presence." The DVD retails for $39.95 (cheap, compared to regular professional blowouts), but one lucky DG reader can win a free copy. To enter, just send the following message from your Twitter account:

RT @deepglamour: #Win Now You Know How...To Blow Dry Your Hair DVD #giveaway #contest RT to enter

Winners will be selected using Random.org. Contest ends at 11:59 p.m. Pacific Time on Monday, September 14, 2009.

[Boy with hair dryer by Flickr user redjar under Creative Commons license.]

--advertisement--

DG Slideshow: "Hats Tell Tales," Photographs by George Hurrell

From Marlene Dietrich and Buster Keaton to Aretha Franklin and Bianca Jagger, George Hurrell captured some of the 20th century's great faces, in hats that added an extra dimension to the characters they portrayed, in film or in life. Click here to see the show.

Glamour Girls

Whether wearing their own (left) or one of Arturo Rios's spectacular creations (right and below, left), guests at the DeepGlamour party demonstrated the enduring glamour of hats. And then there were the more playful approaches. For a full set of party photos, check out the DeepGlamour Flickr pool.

 

--advertisement--